Game Details

Developer: CapcomPublisher: CapcomPlatform: Xbox 360 (reviewed), PS3, PC (planned for November)Release Date: October 2, 2012Price: $59.99Links:Official website | AmazonResident Evil 6 shambles forth this week, a stitched-together monstrosity that bears no small resemblance to the original walking dead, Frankenstein's monster. Capcom's latest is a patchwork assemblage of disconnected ideas and poorly executed gameplay, all of it tied together by a flimsy narrative thread that threatens to snap at any moment beneath the weight of the series' amassed fiction.

There are a few moments of fan-leaning joy to be found, but they're just fleeting chunks of gameplay that nod back to the Resident Evil games of old before giving way to some ridiculously out of place stealth challenge or driving sequence. From a fan's perspective, it's a downright heartbreaking disgrace to Resident Evil 4, the high note that was the series' last game with creator Shinji Mikami.

Resident Evil 6 makes as compelling a case for a series reboot as I've ever seen.

Four flavors of fear, four meandering plotlines

Capcom at least makes an effort to formulate a new approach to Resident Evil gaming in this sixth numbered release. Breaking the larger story down into four separate campaigns, complete with potentially co-op-driven crossover moments, is a cool idea. The execution leaves a lot to be desired, however.

The three main campaigns that you can choose from at the start of the game are all meant to offer stylistically different takes on the series' well-established brand of survival horror. The Leon/Helena section nods heavily to the earliest Resident Evil games, with a slower pace and a more deliberate doling out of the "scare" moments (a term used very loosely here). The Chris/Piers section leans more toward the action focus of RE5 while the Jake/Sherry campaign seems to specifically channel RE3's Nemesis.

That's how it works in theory, at any rate. Each of the three campaigns starts out on roughly the right path. You creep through dark, silent corridors as Leon/Helena, face insurmountable odds as Chris/Piers, and flee constantly from an unstoppable force as Jake/Sherry. The flaws in this design become increasingly apparent with progress, however, as each campaign eventually makes a jarring shift to pure, out-and-out action.

It's the fourth, unlockable campaign, starring Ada Wong, that feels the most classically "Resident Evil." You're alone. You're outnumbered. Your weapons are relatively ineffective and your resources are limited. RE6 never manages to capture the prototypical survival-horror need for careful resource management, but it comes the closest with Ada. Her story only unlocks after the other three campaigns have been completed, however, and just getting that far is asking a lot from the player.

Then there's the overarching narrative, which amounts to a jumbled mass of series lore that has been stitched into an occasionally coherent plot. It's a shame too, since the writing and voice acting in each of the campaigns is actually commendable. You might not know what a C-Virus is or why Umbrella means bad things, but the moment-to-moment relaying of basic facts is handled well. Even if you don't invest in any of these characters, you'll at least understand why they're doing what they're doing.

Why play when you can just mash a bunch of buttons?

Who cares about the story, you say. This is a video game. How does it play? Poorly, I say. It's still fundamentally Resident Evil. The camera sticks tight on the player-controlled character, peering over his or her shoulder to create an intentionally limited field of view. The controls pick up where RE5 left off, handling similarly but adding the ability to move and shoot at the same time.

I'll trot out a bit more praise here: when the action ramps up, RE6 effectively manages to channel some of the best moments of its immediate predecessor. It might not be "classic" Resident Evil, but running around while blasting an assortment of bio-engineered monstrosities in their ugly faces continues to be fun. True, you can have that sort of fun in any number of other games, but the general feel and spirit of the series is definitely captured the best in these sections.

Those moments are unfortunately few and far between, though. Capcom doesn't really seem to have a grasp on what Resident Evil is or should be anymore, and RE6 has a little bit of everything as a result. Do you like sneaking around quietly? Driving snowmobiles? Shooting things from the relative safety of a turret? It's all there in a dizzying shower of disparate ideas, alongside a raft of infuriating quick time events.

Oh yes, you will mash buttons in response to blatant on-screen prompts in Resident Evil 6. All the buttons. Thumbsticks too. And you'll have to try many of these button-mashing events more than once, most likely. Even when you see a quick time event coming, the response window for each prompt too often closes before your brain can recognize the onscreen icon and transmit that information to your fingers. This is most infuriating in the context of boss fights, since failure often results in a Game Over screen.

This also speaks to a larger problem that Resident Evil 6 has: it fails over and over to provide players with enough information to figure out what needs to be done. You might think that you have to shoot at the rampaging monster that's tearing apart your in-flight helicopter from the outside, but in actuality you simply have to survive an invisible timer. If you had known that, you might have also put a bit more effort into conserving ammunition and, in doing so, avoided the Game Over screen that popped up in the next section when you were asked to shoot a fuel tank with your empty clip.

Beyond the campaigns, you've also got Agent Hunt and Mercenaries modes to mess around with. Mercenaries is nothing new; you run around, scoring kills/combos and racking up points as you race against a clock. I only spent a little bit of time in Agent Hunt during the pre-release period; it seems like a fun novelty, but the controls for the bio-organic weapon enemies sucked all the fun out of it for me.

There's also additional replay value in Resident Evil 6's skill system, which sees players earning points through campaign play that can be spent on boosts like improved firearm/melee power, increased item drops, infinite ammo, and the like. Similar features in RE4 and RE5 effectively transformed those games during subsequent playthroughs, but the pacing in each hour-long chapter is so out of whack that it's hard to get excited about jumping back into any of them.

A failure of epic proportions, and perhaps the end of an era

Capcom fumbled badly here, perhaps even to the point that the Resident Evil franchise as we've come to know it is effectively finished. Maybe that's a good thing, though. The game may be a mess, but it also serves to highlight what Resident Evil should not be. I'd like to believe that we've reached a breaking point, and that Capcom will have to rebuild from scratch going forward.

That doesn't help in the here and now, however. Resident Evil 6 is a spectacular failure on nearly every level. The best thing I can say is that the moment-to-moment beats of each campaign are at least coherent and that the action occasionally—very occasionally—leans toward the sort of gameplay we've come to expect from the series in this post-RE4 world. It's a messy and unenjoyable experience though, and it should be avoided by anyone who feels a fan connection to the series.

The Good:

Each campaign's plot is easy to follow if you overlook the frequent nods back to Resident Evil lore.

A few brief sections effectively capture the spirit of the series and what makes it fun.

The Bad:

You're fighting with poor controls and a wildly swinging camera as frequently as you're fighting enemies.

Each campaign loses focus over time, eventually falling back on straightforward action.

Bafflingly short response windows for the abundance of quick time events.

The series' identity is lost in the wash of a wide mix of misplaced gameplay styles.

The Ugly:

The fact that millions will no doubt buy this clunker on name recognition alone.

112 Reader Comments

This game is a far cry from its predecessors. I still remember when I scared myself as a kid playing the original. In comparison, this is just a joke. The entire franchise has been in a downward spiral for some time now.

Are you on Chrome on Windows by any chance? Chrome just recently changed their font engine (messes with sub pixel rendering) and it's causing issues on Ars.

As a frame of reference, seeing the same mangled font with both IE10 and Chrome 22 on Win8 here.

Edit: Also, if relevant, disabling Cleartype makes it look even more distorted. What I don't understand is, what's special about the 6 in this particular headline? I've seen plenty of other Ars headlines with numbers in the past and this is the first time I've ever seen such a problem.

Are you on Chrome on Windows by any chance? Chrome just recently changed their font engine (messes with sub pixel rendering) and it's causing issues on Ars.

As a frame of reference, seeing the same mangled font with both IE10 and Chrome 22 on Win8 here.

Edit: Also, if relevant, disabling Cleartype makes it look even more distorted. What I don't understand is, what's special about the 6 in this particular headline? I've seen plenty of other Ars headlines with numbers in the past and this is the first time I've ever seen such a problem.

I'm seeing it on IE8/WinXP here (a work machine.)

More OT, sounds like this is the 'Tomb Raider Angel of Darkness' moment for the RE franchise. Hopefully they'll be able to get back on track with the next game.

that '6' in the title is more badass than the game. Gamespot gave this game a 4.5, they have been fairly unbiased in the past and i feel like its probably a good assessment. Why have a game, when you can have just a series of quicktime events!!?

Ever since RE 4 (heretically enough), I've thought the series needs a reboot. It's laboring under a massive weight of lore that pretty much forces the franchise away from where (IMO) it needs to be - survival horror - and into a superagent action context that simply doesn't work. If it were up to me, I'd scrap existing lore entirely, remake RE 1, and take the story in a much simpler direction for sequels.

IMHO what point from the Bad section have we not had in previous RE series?

The Bad:

-You're fighting with poor controls and a wildly swinging camera as frequently as you're fighting enemies.Check (most main series RE's, maybe lesser degree in RE4)

-Each campaign loses focus over time, eventually falling back on straightforward action.Ditto, besides, what focus?

-Bafflingly short response windows for the abundance of quick time events.RE4 and RE5 weren't too bad, regardless, they were annoying enough during more cinematic sequences...

-The series' identity is lost in the wash of a wide mix of misplaced gameplay styles.wide mix of gameplay styles, hmmmmm, wasn't that the whole RE genre (puzzle, 3rd person shooting and bit of action adventure or on-rail mixed)?

It looks like ass in Windows - tested in IE 9, FF 15, Chrome 22 all in Win 7, tested same three browsers inn Win 2k3 with the same result. I don't have Opera, Safari, or XP installed, so I can't check those variables.

It looks right in OS X, both in Safari and Chrome, on a MBP and iPad 3.

I've become something of an Apple convert, but it does seem like a problem if Windows users can't see the site correctly.

Holy font on the italicized 6 in the title. It looks about as good as the review makes the game sound :x

Are you on Chrome on Windows by any chance? Chrome just recently changed their font engine (messes with sub pixel rendering) and it's causing issues on Ars.

Yes and yes. I know your pain, I've been fighting Chrome + Windows 7 weird font thing for ages... It's about time they do something about it. However it looks like that problem has not yet been solved...

every once in a while, I'll see a thread about people's "scariest moments in gaming." In these threads, someone invariably posts about that time the dogs jumped through the window in Resident Evil. You'd think that, since it seems to make a lot of lists for the "best" moments in gaming, that you'd want to incorporate that feel into your games.

Maybe they should make you walk like a "tank" in the games and gather stuff to solve puzzles, but when a lot of enemies come on the screen you get an adrenaline burst or something and the camera moves over the shoulder and you can run and gun rather than pick well placed shots.

I liked the original gameplay better. It felt more like my beloved point and click adventure games with some combat thrown in for good measure.

It looks like ass in Windows - tested in IE 9, FF 15, Chrome 22 all in Win 7, tested same three browsers inn Win 2k3 with the same result. I don't have Opera, Safari, or XP installed, so I can't check those variables.

It looks right in OS X, both in Safari and Chrome, on a MBP and iPad 3.

I've become something of an Apple convert, but it does seem like a problem if Windows users can't see the site correctly.

It might be a weird corner-case of the font-rendering technique that Windows uses vs the one that Mac OSX uses.

Windows tries to align things to the pixel grid so as to minimize aliasing and improve readability, whereas Mac OSX ignores the pixel grid and uses aliasing to try and allow the final result to stay as true to the font design as possible. Most of the time, the differences aren't so stark (from my experience). Maybe this particular font, italicized, and particularly for the 6 character, it causes some funky weirdness.

Its really funny how a good amount of these comments are geared towards the "6" in the review, rather than the review or game its self! /giggle.

I have been a RE fan since the beginning. Part of the things I loved about the series where the puzzles, the zombie survival, and the lore. Its part of the reason I kept coming back. I wanted to understand more why Dr. Issac's did what he did, or why Weskler is crazy (IMO). I am still a huge fan.

Part of what through me off with 5 was the advancement of the story, but yet it still holding onto the old RE lore. I have to agree that its time to either move the RE series into a new direction, letting go of the base lore and establishing its own new line. I still enjoyed RE5. The quick action scene's were very annoying and I can only dread what is coming in RE6...